Database Underground | Sean McCown

Quest LiteSpeed 5.0 Update

Sean McCown — 2008-08-28T10:27:59-08:00

My initial look at the new version of LiteSpeed READ MORE

How's LiteSpeed doing?

Sean McCown — 2008-08-25T09:28:33-08:00

Quest just released LiteSpeed 5.0 READ MORE

Upgrade complete

Sean McCown — 2008-08-12T08:53:17-08:00

The answer to my SQL Server 2008 x64 upgrade problem. READ MORE

SQL Server 2008 install notes

Sean McCown — 2008-08-11T09:12:28-08:00

More notes from the field on installing the new version of SQL Sever. READ MORE

Can't upgrade to Katmai

Sean McCown — 2008-08-07T10:26:27-08:00

OK, I know I just blogged, but I wanted to give you the results of my first official upgrade experience to Katmai. To recap the last blog, BOL says that you can't upgrade from x64 Enterprise to x64 Enterprise in Katmai. You have to upgrade to developer and the upgrade that to enterprise. So I got my developer edition and went for the upgrade. And not to be too surprised, I'm getting the exact same error. It appears as though my Yukon Enterprise on Windows 2008 can't be upgraded to Katmai in any way. I wonder what's going on with... READ MORE

The feeding frenzy

Sean McCown — 2008-08-07T08:59:34-08:00

SQL Server 2008 setup notes and technical resources. READ MORE

No more Katmai.

Sean McCown — 2008-08-06T12:10:05-08:00

Microsoft goes RTM with SQL Server 2008. READ MORE

21 characters to paradise

Sean McCown — 2008-07-11T08:19:06-08:00

Powershell gives SQL Server a huge boost. READ MORE

Real application testing: Oracle's new bread and butter

Sean McCown — 2008-07-10T11:21:32-08:00

For those of you who read my review of Oracle 11g you know what a fan I am of their real application testing. In fact, I think it's their best feature to date in 11g. They've been making some noise for quite some time now that they were going to port this feature to 10g which would make it really useful to those shops who are loyal customers but aren't ready to make the leap to the new platform for whatever reason. Well, I heard today that they've not only got it ported to 10g, but also to 9i R2.... READ MORE

Are books history?

Sean McCown — 2008-06-26T08:30:14-08:00

I've been noticing something recently and I'm seeing it more and more. IT learning resources are moving more and more towards video screencasting and less and less towards the continuation of written material. Now, I'm not predicting the demise of books just yet, but I've noticed that people are asking for video resources more often. I make video training so you may consider me biased, but it's really the opposite. I started doing my videos becuase I was hearing so many people ask for them. That, and the fact that it's so much easier to just show someone how to... READ MORE

Hyperbac is the bomb

Sean McCown — 2008-06-20T11:29:04-08:00

Well, after all these years of using Quest LiteSpeed for my backups in my InfoWorld lab, I've made the decision to switch to Hyperbac. I just don't need the centralized repository in my lab, and I do enough demos that having native SQL syntax for my backups is worth something to me. So LiteSpeed is out and Hyperbac is in. So far I'm loving it too. All of my backup files are smaller than they were with LiteSpeed and it's a nice, robust tool. For those of you who don't know anything about Hyperbac you can watch my video on... READ MORE

Buck and Dan

Sean McCown — 2008-06-16T07:25:56-08:00

OK, so I went to TechED last week and had a really good time. One of the better times I had was meeting with Buck Woody and Dan Jones from the SQL Server dev team. They're in charge of writing SSMS. The basic problem I had with SSMS was its lack of DBA friendliness. I've spoken before about how MS hates DBAs because there are so many problems in the GUI and they don't seem to be doing a thing to fix it. And that holds true now more than ever. My talk with Buck and Dan was interesting to... READ MORE

Instead of packing

Sean McCown — 2008-06-13T20:11:06-08:00

Ok, it's my last night at TechED mostly because it's over, and instead of packing, I decided to download RC0 of Katmai and take some of the new gui features for a spin. I'll be blogging more on this in the coming weeks, but let me tell you this... if you've been playing with the earlier betas, they've done a lot of work between the last one and this one. there are some real features in here. I'll be showing you them in video starting probably this weekend and talking you through some of them. For the most part they're... READ MORE

MidnightDBA

Sean McCown — 2008-06-03T07:21:14-08:00

I've posted this a couple times on my other blog, so I thought I'd go ahead and plug it here too. I've started up a new site with screencast tutorials on SQL Server and windows related topics. It's completely free so go download all the vids you like. It's hosted on kind of a slow server, so if you have problems streaming (and you most likely will), then just download the vid instead. Here's the link... hope you enjoy. So if you like it then tell all your friends. If you don't then keep your mouth shut. MidnightDBA I've also... READ MORE

Access encourages stupidity

Sean McCown — 2008-05-20T12:12:21-08:00

I saw an HBO special called 'Hacking Democracy' the other day, and it talked about this lady who was able to get a hold of Diebold's source code for the software that runs its voting machines. Actually, this is a move that may land Diebold at the top of the IT Darwin Awards list because they had it out on an open FTP site for anyone to grab. Then when she just happened upon it, they started screaming that she stole it from them. Hey, it was just up there for anyone to take. Now, why would this highly-classified software... READ MORE